going to give you the
great fundamental principles which characterize and distinguish
Unitarians.

First, liberty, freedom of the individual to think, think as he will or
think as he must; but not liberty for the sake of itself. Liberty for
the sake of finding the truth; for we believe that people will be more
likely to find the truth if they are free to search for it than they
will if they are threatened or frightened, or if they are compelled to
come to certain preordained conclusions that have been settled for
them. Freedom, then, for the sake of finding the truth.

Second, God. The deep-down conviction that wisdom, power, love, that
is, God, is at the heart of the universe. Third, that God is not only
wisdom and power and love, but that he is the universal Father, not
merely the Father of the elect, not merely the Father of Christians,
not merely the Father of civilized people, but the Father of all men,
equally, lovingly, tenderly the Father of all men.

In the next place, being the Father of all men, he would naturally wish
to have them find the truth. So we believe in revelation. Not in
revelation confined to one book or one epoch in the history of the
world, though we do not deny the revelation contained in them. We
believe that all truth, through whatever medium it comes to the world,
is in so far a revelation of our Father; and it is infallible
revelation when it is demonstrably true, and not otherwise.

The next step, then: in the words of Lucretia Mott, we believe that
truth should be taken for authority, and not authority for truth. The
only authority in the world is the truth. The only thing to which
intellectually a free Unitarian can afford to bow is ascertained and
demonstrated truth. We believe, then, in revelation.

In the next place, we believe in incarnation. Not in the complete
incarnation of God in one man, in one country, in one age, in the
history of the world. We believe in the incarnation of God
progressively in humanity. All that is true, all that is beautiful, all
that is good, is so much of God incarnate in his children, and reaching
ever forth and forward to higher blossoming and grander fruitage. The
difference between Jesus and other men, as we hold it, is not a
difference in kind: it is a difference in degree. So he is the son of
our Father, our elder brother, our friend, our leader, our helper, our
inspiration.

The next principle of Unitarianism is that character is salvation.